A Dark Tide: The Force Awakens
by Create-tion
Summary: When a young Jedi is captured by the rebel forces what kind of past will they reveal? She seems to be an outcast with minimal ties to the Empire, but at what cost? Her heart is dark and cold, vivid with the force driving behind her. Was she dark from the start? Can she be brought back from the edge...Can she bring Kylo home? Why does she continue to harbor her hatred...
1. It was Night

Stoke grabbed my arm, twisting, dragging my feet forward through the dirt. My eyes stung with cold night air as the panic welled within my chest. My fingers dug into the dry fracked palm of my brothers wrist as he pulled me. I realized the immediate danger of the situation but my feet stumbled with fear, tripping just over the other as we ran. Stoke was more acclimated to this sort of fighting, ever since he'd joined the rebellion, and I was left alone. Stoke wanted me to stay out of the fight, safely at home, and I couldn't deny him that right. Our parents had been killed by the people Stoke wanted dead…the Empire.

Stoke stopped suddenly doubling back in a seized shock. He grabbed both my shoulders rapidly staying my body before it crashed into his. His eyes were wide, brimming with alertness that I did not harbor. The fog of sleep still clung as a shroud over my brain.

"You have to go!" He shouted. The noises enveloped is in a wave that my mind was suddenly hyper aware of. I turned deftly scanning the mass expanse of forest surrounding us. Lights flashed rapidly burning my eyes as things hit the ground around us. It took a moment to realize the things raining down around us were laser cannons and blasters. It was an ambush in the middle of the night. My heart skipped a beat as my eyes finally settled back on Stoke's in realization.

"No!" I screamed back clawing for grip on his forearms that held me still. "I will not leave you!"

Stoke's brow creased over his cerulean eyes as he watched the determination on my face. I would not lose my brother, the only thing I had left.

"You have to go Shallik! You must…" He pleaded.

"I will no…"

Everything exploded within the very instant my words formed. I was thrown backwards, my back slamming against the cold ground.

My head reeled. I felt as if someone had taken my head and slammed it against a wall. Blood bubbled up from the back of my throat and I groaned trying to right my body. I ended up in a half turn, using the ground and my elbows for support, as I coughed vividly.

"Stoke!" I shouted with a hard rasp. My throat burned as I whipped my head around vividly trying to sort out the desperation of the situation.

"Stoke!" I screamed harder scrambling to my feet shaking. This couldn't be happening. This could not be what was happening. I needed Stoke. I needed him like breath to my lungs. He was everything I had left!

"Shallik…" I heard his voice call softly from just feet away.

I ran in his direction. Stoke would survive. Stoke would be alright.

"Stoke!" I gasped rushing forward falling to my knees at his side. My knees crunched against the hard dirt scraping into the pebbles beneath them. I couldn't bother with the pain. My arms scooped under the shoulders of my brother as I held him flush against my body, pulling him closer.

Stoke's hair was matted against his forehead with a dark liquid that looked like ink in the moonlight. Tears welled in my eyes. I knew what this meant. I knew what was going to happen.

I wasn't prepared.

Stoke gently gazed up at me, shallowly breathing, his ribs shaking against me as he stuttered to speak.

"Shallik," he whispered as puffs of air fell from his lips. I knew it would be amount his last. "You have to get away. You have to run. Get away from here as fast as you can."

There was an undeniable rage that filled me. My heart felt heavy as his chest slowed. My eyes faded into a blackness from which there was a tunnel of hatred bearing down on my back.

I felt my fingers grip my brother as he lay dying in my arms.

Something called to me, in the dank stench of blood and night, something was beckoning to my soul.

Loss.

Grief.

Anger.

Hatred.

Darkness…

I felt the battery of emotions impale my shaking body.

It ripped apart my bleeding heart.

My head was swelling with the mass amount of an innumerable climate of the bare skeletons of the emotions that I could not even begin to grasp.

Stoke breathed out.

My mind shattered. In one brief elastic haze of a second, my entire being was nothing more than unadulterated pain.

I was broken.

As I stood from the spot in which I had been kneeling with Stoke, there was a fully encompassing vibration that enveloped my body.

I felt a pull, a twinge, against my mind in which I had never felt before.

I narrowed my eyes ahead on the oncoming storm troopers that invaded my home.

My brother was dead.

I knew but was not aware of bringing my arms up with my hands curled in a sadistic manner.

There was a bright intense wave of heated vibration that suddenly ripped lose and rolled off my body.

I screamed, snarling uncontrollably, as the wave rolled off of me.

Trees cracked breaking at the trunk as the wave hit them.

Two storm troopers fell to their knees as blood splattered from hinges left uncovered under their armor.

The air around me was rippling and charged as I fell to my knees.

I still felt my voice trailing off as the scream died.

He was dead. Stoke was dead.

 _Stoke watched as Shallik stumbled away from him._ _He wanted to shout out to her. He felt utter_ h _opelessness well inside his lungs as he fought to attempt and make a noise for her attention. Stoke registered that he was unable to make noise any longer. He couldn't speak. His entire body felt cold._

 _There was a heavy pressure that built in an instant around him where he laid._

 _Stoke panicked. It couldn't be. Shallik could not be force burden as well. His father had lied to him if she was._

N _o! No, she wouldn't be safe!_

 _Damnit!_

 _The energy that rolled from Shallik's body was a level of which Stoke was stilled as he breath left him._

 _Shallik's force was dark. It was as dark as it could come._

 _It was bare with rage and hatred of which he'd tried to hard to protect her from._

 _He'd failed._

 _Shallik had instantly turned to the dark embellishment of the force and let it cripple her mind._

 _Stoke watched through glazed eyes as she fell to her knees…_

 _His last breath escaped him._

 _She was alone._


	2. One Step Away

I sat up quickly retching in my throat as I gulped down huge waves of air. My brother's death was still fresh against the edges of my mind as my eyes adjusted blearily to the dim light. The cool touch of metal stung the palm of hand as I gripped the blaster bringing it out from under my pillow. I was still fighting off the dark waves of shock after having watched my brother die again. It hurt my heart. My chest ached. It was within this dark languid moment that I felt the distant ebb of something much more dark and sinister than anything my human heart could really feel. My brother had called it the power of the Force. After his death, I'd realized that our parents had hidden just how connected to it I was as well. After his death, I hadn't been able to find anyone who could tell me what this part of myself was. The group we'd been living with after our parent's death, the rebels, had been killed that night. Without my parents or my brother I'd been bought and sold after being taken captive like an animal. They'd traded me to a man on a planet and left me there to forget about. I'd been young then and unable to do very much. As I'd grown, I learned how to support myself and grown stronger. Only just a few short years I'd bought my freedom finally after taking a deal with the very people I hated. However, I'd never hate the Empire as I did the Rebels. My brother had recklessly given his life for those naïve idiots. Besides, the Empire paid well and my job gave me everything I'd ever wanted. I got to travel and I got to keep to myself. I couldn't really ask for more.

I grappled for a moment with the wrap around tether belt I'd scraped tougher from an old piece of leather and shoved the blaster onto my hip into the holster. My gloves were worn and bare in spots, missing over a few fingers, and the dank air slid over my skin. I was still tired. I was still blinking back sleep from my eyes. My body ached from traveling the previous weeks and from the nasty bruising along my ribs. I'd earned the bruises from a mean trader who'd skipped out on his loot he owed the Empire. I wasn't a Bounty Hunter necessarily, I'd taken the chance a few years ago when offered, to be a hunter of money and goods. I found people who owed them and made them pay…one way or another. If they refused, I took what they owed the Empire and returned with it. I never brought the people back. I was a sort of officer for them. If I failed, I not only didn't get paid, but the person I'd left behind would most likely be taken to them by a real Bounty Hunter or killed. I tried not to slice out the details too often or I wound up feeling bad about the line of work I'd taken.

I traced my fingers gingerly over the bruise covering my ribs. The man had smashed me into a metal table in a rather seedy establishment before I'd gained the upper hand by bashing his head off the same table. I figured it wasn't his lose to feel what he'd made me feel. It was just payment. I sighed and quickly pulled my thin shirt down and made to grab the pliant fabric I usually wrapped around my head. It kept the wind from biting into my face too much and also helped to hide that I was a girl when in public. I rushed for the covered opening to where I lived listening at the entrance as I pulled the curtain back to make sure that no one was outside. I'd made a lean to shack outside of town to stay away from the trading ports but so that I'd still be close enough if I was summoned by the Empire's troops for the odd jobs that were requested of me. I was late. The sun was already high in the sky as the testy wind swept wisps of dirt and sand up around my face. I let the curtain swing shut still swaying in it's motions behind me as I set off on the walk to town. I wasn't nearly in the mood to deal with the Empire dogs this morning but if I was more than a few minutes late to our meeting I knew they'd dock the pay offering for my job by almost half. I broke into an ardent stride to make up for the time that my memories had kept me asleep. It wasn't really my fault, sometimes things happened, but that's not how the Empire worked.

My brain was on overdrive when I arrived at the port for the trading post just inside the city. It was the middle of the week, which meant utter chaos as the new shipments had arrived, and I'd known better since the troops had just docked as well. I sucked in a quick breath and ripped the cloth down from around my face. I was covered in a heavy sweat that made me look both exhausted and unkempt. I scanned the traders post and glimpsed the shining vessel of pure white armor that were the men I was searching for. As I'd started forward, something stopped me. A heavy sodden feeling tore at my insides, like a gnawing termite filled with despair. It was a dark feeling. It was the kind of feeling I normally got when I felt either extremely angry or when someone else was around me that held what my brother had used to call the Dark pull. I was slower in my movements now as I approached the men I needed.

"Are you the Peddler?" one turned asking me as he adjusted his blaster in his arms to show me that I should stop approaching. I stood where I was and nodded.

"Not really a peddler, I sort of acquire things not sell them…" I started. The click of the metal against armor of the other trooper stopped my mouth.

"Come with us to receive your job." I sighed and nodded. There was on reasoning with these guys; talking to one had about the same mental stimulation during the conversation as speaking with a piece of white spray painted cardboard.

"You're late." The General of this fleet or troops I supposed snapped at me as I entered the rear of the ship's hanger.

"I apologize." There was silence to my golden response.

"Your job will pay nicely this time. Find the whereabouts of this man and you will not need another job for a year." He tapped the table in front of us that had a small metallic orb on it. When his finger fell over it the orb glowed coming to life. It spewed a holographic image upward about the size of a small rodent of a man wearing a long sand resistant robe. He had a heavy beard growing and was nearly bald. I narrowed my eyes digesting this information. They were asking me to give this man up basically for execution. I'd never taken a job like this before.

"Are we talking money or food rations?" I asked as the image flickered out before dying away.

"Both. Take it or leave it." He said gruffly turning to face me.

"Do I have a choice?" I asked. It was bold, but I'd never prided myself on intelligence.

"You have the choice to say yes." Or say no and get taken into custody.

"Who do I contact when I find him?"

I guess I was only a step away from Bounty Hunter anyway…


	3. You Don't Know Do You?

Sand stung my face as the sun beat against my back. I grappled for a moment to free my hand from my shawl before pulling the fabric higher up around my nose. It shielded my nose and mouth which were gritty and dry now. My patience was thin. I had never actually served anyone up to the Empire on a platter like this. My usual style was to handle it on my own and produce results so that they didn't have to go find anyone. I didn't particularly want to see anyone actually die. If I was being paid what they'd told me I was being paid, then this man was going to be in a lot of pain and wish for death or it would find him instantly. I didn't have much to go on and they hadn't told me much other than a general description. I was on my own from there.

I'd spent most of the morning wading through the town to get pieces of details about the man. He was near, but they'd failed to find him twice before, hence my hiring. Tracking was something I had always been good at. My brother had taught me when I was very young in case I was ever separated from him and needed to find my way back to a town or port. However, I had a sneaking suspicion that I wasn't using this learned skill for anything that he have approved of. In fact, I knew that Stoke would have rebuked me for what I was doing this very moment. It stood against everything that he'd fought for. I never understood his obsession with the Empire as an enemy. No, I didn't like them, and yes, I feared them; but the fact remained that the Rebellion has been equally as dangerous. Plenty of people has been killed on both sides. The Rebellion has taken my brother from me by brainwashing him into becoming a mindless soldier. Exactly the same thing many people claimed the Empire did to create Storm troopers. I didn't care. My brother hadn't been a storm trooper. He had been a member of the Resistance and I'd lost him because of them. I couldn't forgive that. I wouldn't forgive that and someday I'd find the useless piece of trash that had enlisted my brother in their untrained army. He would regret what he'd done…

I stumbled on a scraggly rock wedged deep within the sand beneath my feet. I hadn't been able to see it. I righted myself quickly and coughed, sputtering, because I'd let my shawl down from my mouth and sucked in a large gulp of blasting air. Sandy air…I was close to an encampment that looked to be a small shack-like building. The sun was beginning to lower in the sky and I didn't doubt that my journey home would be in the dark. There was an uncovered mass of old heaping junk and metal partially buried around the encampment, meant to block out the dunes that were forming around the building. I started towards them. From all the information I'd gathered, this man stayed very far from town, traded very little and not often, barely kept in contact with anyone for supplies, and lived in a shell of a shack buried in the sand. This was the closest thing to that description I'd been able to find out this way. I realized that the Empire would not have come this far out among the old ruins hiding in the sand. No one lived out here. They'd never have thought to come out this far, this far from water, this far from supplies, you'd have imagined they'd have died out here.

If I knew one thing though, it was that you could survive where you had too. If this man had a reason to be hiding from the Empire, and my pay suggested he did, then he'd learn to survive where you could hide. I approached the building along the side of the hulking mass of metal. The sand repetitively lapped at the side of it with soft sounds like chimes. I knew that no one could hear me coming over the wind, so I was surprised when the door to the hatch on the side of the haul to the shack opened. I stopped and shrank back against the metal out of sight and sank to my knees down into the sane quietly. My nimble fingers silently plied around the blaster at my hip, popping the holster, and I waited. The man walked outward from his shell and glanced around.

He was tall, about another half of myself, with a balding head and a beard that scrapped his chest, his eyes were vibrant like the water on the ships of the Empire. Clear and clean. The man couldn't have been much older than his mid-forties perhaps late. His eyes swept the area where I hunched. I felt his presence at the back of my mind through the metal separating us. My mind flexed and pushed as the vibrations began to become hyper aware around me with the same feeling that I'd come to grow used to when a battle was a possibility. My body was prepared for a fight.

"I know you're there. Come on out." The man spoke in a raspy voice. I stiffened. He knew I was here? How? I knew he hadn't seen me. I knew there was no way he could have heard me over the wind. My brain quickly flipped through something that I'd done wrong until it settled snapping on the only thing that could have alerted him to my presence.

"I can feel you. There's no use in hiding. Come on out." He said again in a calm voice. In fact, I would venture to have suggested that his tone was amused. I narrowed my eyes and stood.

I squared my shoulders and leaned my neck to the side to crack it. This was going to go easy or not at all. I wasn't trained to fight those who had what my brother used to call the Force. He had been one like that. It had always been something that had sparked my interest but I'd never really had the gull to search much about it. After I'd left the disaster of my old home, I'd left all of that behind.

I came out from behind the metal wall and held my blaster clearly visible in my right and left hands, arms bent ready to pull up and fire if needed. I met the man's eyes and kept a steady trained lock between the two of us. There was a grossly intense feeling that started in my gut. It was like I was being pulled towards him but at the same time a feted ache began in my chest. It was the same angry pang that I got often around certain people. It crossed my mind that in this man's age he could have been there when we had been kids, but I couldn't remember his face and I didn't have time to concentrate on anything else. The man smirked.

"Well aren't you an interesting little thing. Are you doing that on purpose?" he asked me intently. He stared at me like he was trying to figure out a puzzle that there was a lock too. I planted a foot behind myself and leveled the gun at him.

"Doing what?" I humored him.

"You're throwing off so much energy that I could get a burn if you were standing any closer kid."

"I don't know what you mean." I snapped annoyed. "Listen, you and I need to have a serious conversation. I don't want this to go the wrong way…" I started to say but before I could finish he moved.


	4. Get Out

**Hey all! I'm really enjoying this story so far and I'm hoping that you are too! It would be great if some of my readers on here could stop by at the end and offer up some comments for the story! I want to know what you guys are thinking about what's happening so far! Thanks so much for reading! It makes me so happy!  
C~***

In the moment that I'd taken to blink, he'd come forward three paces and drawn a weapon that I wasn't prepared to fight against. In the same instant he made a deliberate snatch for my blaster. I choked. I didn't have the heart to pull the trigger, I'd never killed anyone, only roughed them up. He grabbed the top of the blaster and began to wrench it from my grip. I staggered forward with it refusing to initially let go. However, he bested me. A searing hot light sprang to life and came swirling down towards my face. There was the familiar raging pull in my chest that vibrated outward from my body. I knew something was coming at me, without needing to look I reacted. I sidestepped releasing the blaster from my hands and moved to the left to avoid having that side of my face seared off. The heat flowing from the blade was enough to still me instantly in my tracks. As soon as it had illuminated outward and at me, it was gone. The man in front of me had retracted the blade and stood smirking. Before I could react, he tossed the blaster that he'd bested from me back at me chuckling.

"How did you know which way to dodge kid?" he asked shrugging. "Too much distraction going on for you to have seen me move…something to think about." He turned and waved a hand over his shoulder walking back towards the shack. "Come on in kid. Let's talk inside and get out of this godforsaken sand."

He didn't seem concerned or at least he didn't care that my blaster was trained on his back as we walked inside. I stayed hesitantly behind at a safe distance, I didn't trust him yet, and I didn't have a reason to. I followed him to a living type area, where a makeshift bed laid on the floor with a shabby blankets covering its metal frame. He leisurely flopped down onto it and stretched his arms above his head smirking at me. He leaned back on the heels of his palms and waited as if I was supposed to answer some unknown question.

"I'm going to assume you've come here to train." He let his head rest against one side of his shoulder.

"I don't need training from you. Listen, this is fairly simple." I said keeping the blaster on his chest, even though I knew that it wasn't going to produce much of a fight. Sometimes my line of work was all bluff and intimidation.

"Oh?" he chuckled.

"Get you crap, you have less than two minutes, one bag full. No more. Let's move." I said in a stern tone.

"Well, you've been doing this for a while haven't you?" he shook his head. "Kid, I'm not going anywhere. The sun's going down and it's going to be nasty tonight with the wind. I'm not traveling in that mess. You're more than welcome to however if you think you can make it."

"I've made worse." I narrowed my eyes at him. "Get moving. You've got a minute and a half now." I let my finger edge on the trigger to emphasize my point.

"You won't take me in." he said sure of himself. "You won't take me in because I can help. By the way, who am I even being taken to might I ask?"

"The Empire." I snapped. "One minute."

"Or what peach? You'll shoot me?" he asked standing up. The calm leisurely smile fell from his face and he became very serious now.

"You're not a bounty hunter. I can see it in your eyes. You haven't killed a single person in your life." He paused thinking for a moment. "Not by your hands anyway. You won't kill me and you won't take me to the Empire. I'm surprised you found me though, you're pretty good at sniffing someone out kid." He walked towards me. I didn't take a step back. I kept my body stiff. He was correct in every single thing that he'd accused me of. I felt the first set of nerves set in.

The heavy feeling inside my chest was welling up again and surging through my body in small waves. I was ready for him to make a move again.

"You won't take me in because you _know_ I can tell you more about people like your brother."

He put a hand on my blaster.

Ice went through my veins.

He was right, or course, but no one had talked about my brother since he'd been alive. No one except for me and I know I hadn't told this man about him. My eyes must have widened a fraction and my grip slipped on the blaster. He was able to easily and gently push my hands and it down so that it was at my side. He stood over me looking down at me.

"How do I know?" he asked repeating the question that had been swimming around inside my brain.

"I never…"

"I could see it all flashing through your mind when we were standing outside. I saw your brother, I felt the love for him inside you, I felt the way you squashed it down so you didn't feel it, and I felt the same presence inside him that you remember…" he reached out and tapped a finger against my flat chest.

"Inside you."

"That's a load of crap." I said shaking my head. "My parents knew that only my brother was different." I snapped hotly. I was highly annoyed and I didn't want this guy inside my head.

"If you want me out, then keep my out. Put up a wall." He said simply. "Stop me."

Without warning I felt a sharp intrusion inside my head, an intake of air that paused my thoughts and invaded them like someone had split my head open. I felt like he'd laid out my thoughts and was flipping through them like a book. I saw flashes of my brother running across a field with my chasing after him when we were younger, I saw Stoke sewing my blanket back together as I sat on his lap crying because it had ripped while I was playing, I saw him talking with another man who'd been training him…

The feeling in my chest was winding tighter.

My anger was thin.

This man shouldn't be seeing my thoughts.

He didn't deserve to see Stoke.

I ground my teeth and closed my eyes.

"Stop it." I spat out.

"Make me." He replied.

I saw my brothers face lying dead in the snow. I saw the blood pooling.

" _Get out_ …" I seethed.

" _ **Make**_ _Me_." He repeated harder.

There was a sharp push and I snapped. The coiled feeling inside my chest ruptured and I was unable to contain it any longer. I lost control. Without being able to help it my mind went dark, blank like a slate, and the push that had been invading was suddenly very forcefully shoved back outward like a string being jerked hard. There was an instant pressure release before I felt the anger ebb again. The black faded to red and I couldn't stop it. I heard the man gasp in front of me but there was no way to override the feeling burning through my body.

I saw the black turn to red.

" _Do not ever do that again_." I hissed angrily. There was another small choking noise before the heavy feeling incinerating my mind receded.

When my vision cleared I saw the man had moved a foot back from me and that he was rubbing his neck staring at me wide eyed.

"You're…raw…" he rasped out with wide eyes. "Pure anger…" he coughed before turning it into a small shaky laugh. "I don't know how to train you exactly." His voice was beginning to clear up.

"What…" what had happened? I couldn't quite understand how he'd moved, the movement was lost in my brain. It was as if I had blacked out but another part of myself knew what had happened and wouldn't tell me.

"You just blocked me out. And you might have choked me…but that's alright I suppose. I deserved it. I was poking at something that wasn't really my business to see." He rubbed his neck one more time before straightening to an upright position to watch me again.

"How…" I still wasn't able to fit everything together.

"You're parents lied to you kid. Your brother wasn't the only one who could use the Force. You can too. You just haven't been shown how too."


	5. Get It Done

There was an earsplitting rupturing noise directly beside my head. I shot upright scrambling forward away from the bed, ears ringing, and blindly grasped for the blaster I normally stashed and hid under a table near where I now slept. Unfortunately, as my fingers curled around open air, I remembered in my sleepy haze that Gurt had made me give up my blaster weeks ago. Gurt had gone on and on about the Force being an all being enveloping energy like substance that would not go well with my blaster. He'd recommended that I learn to fight based on instinct and the inclinations of the energy that apparently I'd been radiating off myself for some time. He'd insisted that I learn to react by trusting the Force and without ignoring it. Which all of this lead to my current predicament.

I shot to my feet and sucked in a hard quick breath. Without a blaster my reactions would have to be purely based on the Force. My eyes widened and a shiver ran down my body as several thoughts blurted through my mind. Had the First Order come for me? Where was Gurt? Was he dead? I felt an invigorating rush suddenly of clarity blister under my skin and my mind snapped into focus. With no blaster, my senses were tightening, and I was ready to spring into action. Weaponless, the first thought that shot through my mind was to run. I had nothing to fight. Another shot splattered the wall behind me and I jerked running at the only entrance and exit to the room; the door. As I came forward my mind tingled, almost shifting, towards grabbing a piece of junk material leaning against the wall. I picked the metal up and shoved it against my body like a shield and rammed the person standing in the doorway. As they hit the frame, I heard laughing. I stumbled out the door and turned sharply to hear Gurt's voice.

"That's going to leave a bruise." He smirked straightening himself holding his side from where I'd shoved him. My ears still ringing, head pounding, the tingling of the force ebbed away from my body. The fight was over.

"What the _hell_ is wrong with you?" I snapped throwing the metal piece to the floor listening to it clatter.

"I told you. You have to learn to fight on the go and in situations where that blaster isn't your only weapon." I held my hand over my ear rubbing it.

"I didn't have ANY weapon." I shouted coming a step forward at him. I raised my voice angrily dropping my hand from my ear. Red flashed through my mind.

"That feeling you have now." Gurt snapped unmoving. "That's the feeling you need to have in a fight. If I had been a stormtrooper what would your plan have been after you shoved me?"

"I don't know!" I shouted. "Sorry my brain was a little fuzzy, you shot a BLASTER at my head!" I threw my arms up agitated.

"What do you think it will be like when someone has a blaster to your head!? What about a saber at your throat!? There isn't time for you to act like a child here. I'm trying to train you for the real life position you are in now." Gurt grabbed my arm yanking me forward.

"When the First Order comes for you, when they realize what you're capable of, what will you be able to do to stop them?" his grip intensified on my arm as he spoke. "I have not been able to secure a trip that would put you closer to the Resistance at this point. They are not letting anyone but First Order trades and ships out and to the ports." His eyes locked mine.

"If you're about to tell me no one is coming for me, then save it." I wrenched my arm back averting my eyes. "I'm alone. I get it. No one's coming to take me where I'm safe. I have to be able to take care of myself." I ground my teeth together stepping away from him as my anger waned.

"You aren't ready to take care of yourself. You have no idea the power you have. When I came at you, the moment I fired, what did you feel?" he asked me.

"It tingled…I don't know…I felt hazy just before and then it snapped open. I was alert and awake." I sighed exasperated.

"And in that moment of clarity you suddenly moved. You came at me with that metal hunk and shoved me out of the way. Did you do it or did you feel like it was the right choice?" I hesitated before answering.

"I felt like it was a natural progression. I thought it, I felt it, I did it." I glanced back up at him.

"You have the connection. It's grown since we started. The problem is that you are so driven by your basic intuition and the way you lived before as a bounty hunter, that you literally can't turn that off. Not to mention how angry you are inside." He sighed setting the blaster down on the table near the door.

"I can't help that." I growled rubbing at my forehead annoyed. He'd been telling me the same things for months.

"You can help that." He gestured at the table. Metallic pieces were scattered across the counter, a mess of work that drove me insane. "Get working and we'll talk later. I have some things that need to be finished up in town." He nodded to me.

"You said it wasn't going to work until I was in tune with the Force." I sighed trudging towards the table to sit.

"You don't have the luxury of waiting for that. Get working on it. Something solid will turn out." He motioned to the main chunk of circular base I had started a week ago.

"Then what use is it to me if it won't last?" I countered staring down at the small crystal laying strewn amongst the parts.

"It's better than not having anything at all and it's better than not having a blaster. Make it work kid. I'll help you learn how to use it." And with that he grabbed his shawl and left the room to head into town.

I supposed he was right. Gurt knew better than I did what use a lightsaber would be in the future for myself. He was also correct in the fact that the First Order would be coming for me very soon. I was now well over the time frame in which they'd given me to find him, so even if they assumed I just hadn't found him, I hadn't reported back in. At this point I was now running from them, in this case hiding. The problem is that I wasn't prepared to fight in a high stakes battle with the First Order. I would lose. There was literally no other way to see the outcome at this point. I was looking at fighting and if it was going to happen Gurt wanted me to be as trained as he could possibly manage for me. He had repetitively explained to me that he wanted to ensure that I survived. He wanted me to go to the Resistance. I didn't. I'd tried to make that clear but he didn't care. Gurt told me that there was nowhere else I would be safe and that with all the rumors flying that Luke Skywalker was not dead, I could find someone better there to train me. I was set on leaving when we had to run, Gurt and I, but I was going to lose him and I would not step foot near the Resistance. I wanted nothing to do with them. I also knew that I couldn't go to the First Order now but I was determined that I could continue running and hiding as long as I needed.

I would find someone else somewhere else to train me and I would survive. I always had. Gurt was wrong about that.


	6. Cut Ties

Shallik was walking back towards the metallic hut in the sand dragging her feet. She was exhausted. Her day had consisted of Gurt sending her on collections errands to secure things for the journey to the Resistance. He'd really just trying to get her out of the hut so he could do whatever, she didn't want to find out. The wind whipped around her blowing hard sand into her face. Shallik sighed pulling the scarf around her neck up over her shin and squinted her eyes. She could just barely make out the crest of the hut in the distance as the dusk threw rays of color off it's reflective walls. There was a harsh night coming, possibly a storm, and from the tingling that she was beginning to feel she was getting a little ancy. She'd not gotten used to the pings of the sand in waves as it hit the metal of the hut at night. It was an unsettling and scary noise that brought her back to the sounds of blasters firing off their homes when they'd been attacked as children. Shallik rubbed at her eyes as more sand kicked up and took a second look over the area near the front of the hut. She could see a figure standing there, in dark clothing, and as she narrowed her eyes she stopped. There were more than one figure there. Several people were standing outside the hut and one of them wasn't standing at all.

A heavy sharp pain splintered down Shallik's back, starting at her neck, and carried to her heels. Something was very wrong. There may have been a storm coming but that was not the reason for this sudden shock of unwavering fear. Shallik recognized the white of the armor bouncing light back at her as she broke out into a sprint towards the hut. Those were storm troopers. She didn't know exactly who the person in black was, but she knew who the person on their knees was. Gurt had his head down staring into the sand as the figure paused just in front of him. He threw his gloved hand out shouting something that Shallik wasn't close enough to make out. She was just outside the sheets in the sand that acted as barriers for the hut. The man in front of Gurt brought out something in his hand and Shallik felt a wave of anxiety hit her. She had to do something.

The item in his grasp sprang to life and she knew instantly what it was; a lightsaber. It's heat and intensity snapped her into panic. There was some serious raw energy pouring out of the saber and filtering through it's side exhausts. She knew Gurt was armed. She knew he had a lightsaber as well! Why wasn't he fighting back. There was a push inside her mind as the man continued to scream at Gurt. The intrusion was most definitely Gurt. He was trying to tell her to run, to go back, to get away from the situation. That was when she really knew, as her body skidded to a halt just on the other side of one of the metal sheets in the sand, that these people had come for her.

"Where is she?" The man in the mask demanded. "Where is the bounty collector?" he snapped.

"I don't know. She left weeks ago." he replied without looking up.

"You are trying my patience. I will ask one more time...where is the girl?" he said bringing the saber to Gurt's throat. The heat exploding off was making him sweat against the collar of his shirt.

"You won't ever find her." he said finally looking up. "I sent her to them. I sent her to the resistance." he smirked.

Shallik had just enough time to feel the push inside her head again to run…

The man in the mask moved in one swift motion.

Shallik let loose a scream of rage so loud it reverberated off the sheet beside her.

Gurt's body fell limply in the sand. Anger overtook her reaction and all reason was gone. She saw red.

In the heat of impulse Shallik threw her arm out curling her fingers. There were a few tugs at his waistband, but the saber came free flying to her. Shallik was only aware of the rage blinding her in the moment. She gripped the lightsaber, her fingers turning white over the hilt, and she took a step forward. She tried to ignore the body lying headless next to the man as she came at him. His attention had been drawn to her the very moment she'd stopped concealing her presences like Gurt had taught her. Gurt…

She felt the anger seethe inside her, ebbing through her chest, and it burnt through her limbs. There were no words exchanged….there was no need to voice the way she felt. This man would know how she hated him, how he cut down someone that was important to her…

A flash of Stoke's body lying bloody in the snow went across her eyes.

She ran at him, lightsaber ready for battle, and she swung.

She collided with his saber locking him, her face screwed up and molten as they threw heat onto them both. She barely registered that the man barked an order for the troopers to lower their weapons as he swung her off easily and came at her. He had her backing away, moving towards the metal sheets, cornering her. She deflected blows but he was strong. Her anger was fueling the fight but as she swung again to make a blow he caught it, flung her off again, and thrust his blade forward into her shoulder. She screamed as he shoved it harder through her body and pushed her down into the ground. Her saber fell from her grasp as she sucked in air, choking on the pain, glaring up at the man.

"You killed him." she spat out. He twisted the blade in her before retracting it.

Kylo Ren watched as the girl twitched when the blade retracted from her body. The alleviation of pain was instant on her face but not enough to wipe the hatred searing up at him. Her eyes spoke volumes as she glared at him. When she spoke her voice was quiet but brutal. He waited a moment for a reaction further from her but when one didn't come, when she didn't get back up to her feet, he took a step closer over her to impress the position she was now in.

"Because of you." he replied. There was a moment of shock on her face before she wiped it clean. The realization in her eyes...the pain there...she couldn't hide it. He was impressed with her ability to shoulder it and lock it away when needed. He understood that kind of emotional camouflage. Then anger flashed back across her face, in her eyes, making her rigid. She sat up on the juxt of her elbow struggling before she spoke.

"His life is on your hands." she snapped back before coughing. Kylo bent down grabbing a fistful of her scarf and shirt jostling her roughly. He drug her up to her feet holding her there looking her in the eyes through the mask.

"Are you the bounty collector?" he asked ignoring her jibe. She spit on his mask. He sighed throwing her down again into the sand.

"Take her to the ship. Confine her. No one but I speaks to the girl." he turned on his heel to walk into the hut. Shallik couldn't grab for the saber in pain but she tried to fight back. The troopers got her about the waist and hoisted her up twisting her arms behind her back shoving her feet through the sand. Kylo felt the stabbing sensation of hatred pointed directly in his direction as he entered the hut but he refused to look back at the girl. She would see soon enough that this anger she felt was a penance compared to the loathing caged inside him. She would bend when he came to interrogate her later…

She would regret engaging him.

He would ensure she paid for the trouble she'd caused by hiding.

Then...when she was used and worthless…

She would die.


	7. Be Still

Shallik felt a dull aching pain ebb at the edge of her shoulder. It was like a gnawing pang that was growing by the second. She struggled to make her eyes open. Her lids felt as if they were grating against one another. There was a groaning noise that felt distant in her ears before she felt her stomach roll. Her body slammed against something hard, metallic, and cold. Her eyes suddenly snapped open as her shoulder hit the ground and her breath was knocked from her lungs. Shallik gasped wide eyed staring up at searing white lights. Her mind was racing; trying to catch up with the significant amount of pain she was swallowing down. Shakily, she reached towards the injured area of her body. Her fingers plied around the wound, gripping it, as if her brain was telling her that holding it would stop the pain. A dark figure huddled over her, blocking the bright light, and clouding her vision for a moment. Her eyes focused much faster this time. As her back lay on the ground, Shallik stared bitterly up at a man with fiery red hair. His distaste was equally glorified back down at her as he stood with his hands clasped behind his back.

"Ah, so you are in fact alive." he stated as if he were simply stating the weather.

Shallik felt a fresh wave of fear run through her veins as an image of Gurt's body flashed through her mind. She remained silent as she ground her teeth.

"I had thought that Ren had injured you badly enough to warrant your death." A sly smirk played across his lips as he watched her attempt to haul her back against the wall behind her. "I am pleased however to find that you are alive. It means that my job is not over with you."

A toe to his boot shifted and he stamped down on her shoulder, cleaving her back down to the floor. She hissed in pain. Her eyes squeezed shut and she tried to rip her hand free from holding her shoulder. He applied an even amount of more pressure.

"They do say that pain allows the brain to think clearly. You will want to be thinking clearly." He removed his foot and leaned down closer to her face. "Because if you do not answer correctly, you will not live to step foot off this ship." When his eyes met hers, she felt a prickling wave of annoyance and anger. Her mouth moved on its own before she could stop it.

"You must really like the sound of your own voice." she spat out shoving her body into a slumped sitting position against the wall. "Or am I just the only one you can get to listen?"

Hux felt a twinge in the corner of his eye as he watched the girl struggle to breathe. How in the world did she still have the energy to waste on being so obnoxiously annoying? He took a deep breath and stood back up.

"I'll start with a very easy question." he turned his back to her ignoring her jibe. He was used to mild threats from Ren as it were now anyway. "Why did you not bring the man in as you had agreed to do?"

Shallik wiped her face clean from emotions that threatened to bubble up from deep inside her chest and sat silently. She wasn't even sure she knew why she hadn't finished this bargain. Her mind was still swirling with too many fraying strings that reality was barely staying in focus for her. Her eyes rolled back as another racking pain splintered her shoulder. They were getting worse. The wound had gone straight through and as Shallik tried to assess the damage while refusing to speak, she realized she couldn't actually move that arm.

"You are useless." Hux sighed taking a step back towards her, circling her like an animal. "I asked you why you did not complete your mission." his teeth clicked as he spoke.

"I don't know." she said as a slick sweat started to bead at her forehead. She was beginning to feel wet and cold.

"That is not," he began by kneeling again in front of her. "an acceptable answer." He grabbed her chin and squeezed so hard she thought her eyes water.

A heavy blind band started to inch along her body. She could feel its strength enclosing her, vibrating with seething hatred, and she wasn't upset about it. Her heart was frustrated, much too tired to continue thinking about how she felt anymore, and her body was in so much pain. There was no way she could possibly keep up this game of interrogation. The anger shrouded her as his fingers dug into her jaw and just as it had before, Shallik allowed the presence inside her body to take over. She was fading into the blackness.

Hux cussed jerking his hand away from the girl angrily. He shot his other hand forward grabbing her shirt yanking her body forward and up. His other hand was stinging hot where he'd been holding her.

"Fine." he said breathing heavily. "I do not need answers."

Shallik felt her body snap back, the fading had stopped, the man was pulling her up to her feet roughly. She fought, stumbling, to right herself as he dragged her across the room, and failed as he threw her full force towards a table.

It was not a surprise when her body hit its hard surface causing her to double over coughing. She gripped its edge wishing the blackness would come back. Gurt had told her to ignore it but in this moment, when she felt so helpless and the pain was writhing through her back and shoulder, she wanted nothing more than to let it take hold.

"I told you, I don't kno…" she started trying to turn herself up to face the man with red hair, but she couldn't finish. Her back hit the table's edge again as he backhanded her so hard she had no time to catch her balance. Her feet faltered and she allowed gravity to bring her to her knees as the shock registered to her brain.

"The time for talking had ended." Hux whispered with his eyes beading down on her.

Hux had spent his entire life bending to those that were perceived to be more powerful than himself. He would not be overshadowed by anyone. No one would belittle him; especially not some little girl with a measly connection to the Force. Ren mocked him on a daily basis with his miserable existence. He did nothing but be constantly compared to Ren when it came to their credibility and job responsibilities. He did not need Ren to complete the task he'd been set forth to do. Snoke was wrong about that. He would never allow Ren to intimidate him with these idiotic powers and neither would a little brat like her. She would regret having the nerve to use that power on him. She would regret breathing if that's what he felt like at the moment. She would regret her entire existence.


End file.
